US State Dept slammed for blaming Israel for Palestinian violence and terror

B’nai B’rith International slammed a US State Department report blaming Israel for Palestinian Arab terror and violence, JTA reported.

Last Thursday, B’nai B’rith International harshly criticized the US State Department for releasing a report that largely blames Israel for Muslim aggression, according to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency (JTA).

“It is astonishing that [the Department of] State is parroting the false Palestinian narrative,” said B’nai B’rith in its statement.

“If it were not released by the State Department, it would be easy to mistake the inflammatory and accusatory language as coming directly from the Palestinians.”

The new US State Department report clearly blames Israel for Arab terrorism, citing a “lack of hope in achieving Palestinian statehood, Israeli settlement construction in the West Bank, settler violence against Palestinians in the West Bank, the perception that the Israeli government was changing the status quo on the Haram Al Sharif/Temple Mount, and IDF tactics that the Palestinians considered overly aggressive.”

The report fails to mention the numerous peace offers that the Palestinian Authority (PA) has rejected or the fact that past Israeli concessions unleashed even more Arab terror and violence.

B’nai B’rith rejected the report’s conclusions and stressed that they contradict statements by President Donald Trump and US Ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley, both of whom have linked the PA’s incitement and terrorist salaries to violence against Israelis.

“Israel is not driving the violence committed by the Palestinians,” B’nai B’rith charged, JTA reported. “It’s Palestinian leadership — Fatah and Hamas — that incites violence against Israelis on a daily basis.”

During violent tensions in Jerusalem’s Old City in September 2015, for example, Abbas released the following statement: “Each drop of blood that was spilled in Jerusalem is pure blood as long as it’s for the sake of Allah. Every [martyr] will be in heaven and every wounded person will be rewarded, by Allah’s will.”

“Al-Aqsa is ours and so is the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. They have no right to desecrate them with their filthy feet. We won’t allow [Jews] to do so and we will do whatever we can to defend Jerusalem,” Abbas added.